An apparatus for practice of ambulation has been proposed in Japanese Utility Model Kokai No. 63-96014, in which a horizontal arm is provided for suspending a person who finds it hard to walk (called "patient" hereinafter) at the distal end, two upright rods are connected at their ends to the proximate portion of the horizontal arm, a short rod is connected to the lower ends of the upright rods so that the four members form a parallelogram, the inner upright rod placed closer to the patient is pivoted at a point in the lower part thereof so as to permit the rod to rotate in the plane including the horizontal arm, and the other upright rod is connected at the lower end to a piston/cylinder unit having a piston for pulling down the rod vertically and a cylinder capable of shifting horizontally. The whole of the apparatus, thus the horizontal arm, is rotatable about the inner upright rod so that the patient suspended by the apparatus can walk around the rod. The patient's walking corresponds to the movement transverse to the horizontal arm. The patient's wobbling corresponds to the movement along the horizontal arm. If the patient wobbles while walking, the horizontal arm suspending the patient shifts longitudinally and the two upright rods are inclined slightly. The inclination of the upright rods causes the piston/cylinder unit to shift horizontally, as such shift is permitted. Thus, the apparatus allows the patient to wobble while walking.
However, the nature of the apparatus allowing the patient to wobble is a disadvantage from the point of view of assisting a patient in the practice of ambulation, because the patient cannot be recovered from the wobbling by the help of the apparatus.
Moreover, the complex structure of the apparatus which permits the inclination of the two upright rods supporting the horizontal arm, keeping the parallel relation, is attended with high costs. The mechanism permitting the horizontal shift of the piston/cylinder unit is desired to be substantially free from frictional resistance, therefore greater precision of the mechanism is required, resulting in higher cost.